The Bratwurst – Milwaukee Bucks Blog

A roundup of the blogger previews on the net for the NBA’s Southwest Division.

Dallas Mavericks
Jake Kerr: Mavs Moneyball

Houston Rockets
grungedave and UofTOrange: The Dream Shake

Memphis Grizzlies
Joshua Coleman: 3 Shades of Blue

New Orleans Hornets
Rohan: At the Hive
ticktock6 & mW: Hornets Hype
Ryan Schwan & Ron Hitley: Hornets247.com

San Antonio Spurs
Graydon Gordian: 48 Minutes of Hell

Enough about the Bucks. Time to look at what’s going on among the good teams, and preview the first round of the playoffs.

Instead of thinking about how teams have played throughout the whole season, I’m a little more interested in how they are playing now. So I calculated IPM power rankings for the last six weeks of the season, which gives a good picture of which series’ might be the most competetive, and where potential upsets may lie.

If you are not familiar with IPM (as I recently learned that my friend Mike Headd is not, despite his having read the blog for nearly a year), it is my proprietary player ranking calculation. IPM stands for Impacts Per Minute, and more about the methodology is available here. I update IPM rankings for all players weekly (here) as well as team power rankings (here). All of this information is also avaliable through the links on the right side of the page.

I’m writing the preview under the assumption that the playoff matchups will not change in the next couple of days. If they do then I will update them accordingly.

Listed next to the team names are each team’s power rank for their offense, defense and overall for the last six weeks. The information is also given here.

On to the preview:

Eastern Conference

1 vs 8. Boston (#4 Offense, #1 Defense, #2 Overall) vs. Atlanta (#9 Offense, #18 Defense, #16 Overall): Welcome back to the big time, Hawks. Blink and you will miss it. Obviously the Celtics completely outclass Atlanta in this series, and it looks to be a 4-0 sweep.

4 vs 5. Cleveland (#13 Offense, #9 Defense, #10 Overall) vs. Washington (#12 Offense, #15 Defense, #14 Overall): The Cavs haven’t really jelled as much as I thought they would since their deadline trades, only going 13-12. They have, however, played a little better than their record, as my numbers say they have underachieved by two games. Washington is struggling to reintegrate Gilbert Arenas into their rotation, and the combination of home court advantage and LeBron James should make this series a pretty easy Cleveland win. I say the Cavs in 5.

3 vs. 6. Orlando (#20 Offense, #6 Defense, #13 Overall) vs. Toronto (#10 Offense, #13 Defense, #12 Overall): This is an interesting matchup — I feel that Orlando has overachieved all season and Toronto has underachieved. They come into this series as an even matchup, but I feel that the point guards will decide this series — and I think that Toronto has a huge advantage there. I’m calling the upset here — Raptors in six.

2 vs. 7. Detroit (#8 Offense, #3 Defense, #3 Overall) vs. Philadelphia (#11 Offense, #11 Defense, #9 Overall): The only Eastern Conference matchup that features two top ten teams over the last six weeks, the Sixers could make some noise against Detroit. However, I think that the Pistons’ veteran savvy will carry this one pretty easily. Pistons in 5.

Western Conference

1 vs 8. LA Lakers (#2 Offense, #12 Defense, #4 Overall) vs. Denver (#3 Offense, #29 Defense, #19 Overall): Despite getting the edge over Golden State by beating them this week, the Nuggets are staggering to the finish line. Recent losses to Seattle and Sacramento highlight the absolute defensive collapse that they are suffering as they abandon that end of the floor to concentrate on scoring. Their home court advantage will win them a game or two, but they cannot seriously challenge Kobe and the Lakers. Lakers in six.

4 vs 5. Utah (#1 Offense, #4 Defense, #1 Overall) vs. Houston (#15 Offense, #5 Defense, #7 Overall): Utah has been the best team in the league for several months, but it hasn’t been borne out in their record, as they have underachieved by 5 games in the last six weeks. The problem is that they are simply dominant at home (36-4) but subpar on the road (17-23). That makes home court advantage the deciding factor in this series, which will be up in the air until the final day. Houston has one more game left than Utah, giving them an edge on getting home court. Even without Yao, the Rockets have been one of the best teams of the second half this season, and maybe this finally is the year that T-Mac finally gets out of the first round. My prediction? Lets see who gets home court advantage. Either way this will be the best first round series (which is saying somethng) and whoever is at home for game seven will prevail.

3 vs. 6. San Antonio (#23 Offense, #2 Defense, #6 Overall) vs. Phoenix (#7 Offense, #14 Defense, #11 Overall): Now the playoffs begin and the Spurs turn it on. One reason their numbers look so bad is that they limit Manu Ginobli’s minutes so much in the regular season. Once he starts playing a little more, look for them to get that much better. Meanwhile, I think that the Suns’ acquisition of Shaquille O’Neal will be exposed as a mistake in the playoffs — in the last six weeks their offensive and defensive rankings have all declined from their full season rankings. Spurs in seven.

2 vs. 7. New Orleans (#5 Offense, #7 Defense, #5 Overall) vs. Dallas (#6 Offense, #10 Defense, #8 Overall): After the acquisition of Jason Kidd, this is the worst possible matchup for Dallas. Kidd couldn’t stay in front of Tony Parker in the finals six years ago, what makes Dallas think he can check Chris Paul now? Meanwhile, the Mavs traded away their best matchup against Paul, Devin Harris, and in the process fell from the #3 seed to the #7. This is actually a pretty close matchup with two top-ten teams, but the Hornets are simply a little better at both ends of the court. Hornets in seven.

I’n not going to call the second round, but I guess I should give my finals prediction: Boston over San Antonio.

Without much new Bucks news to report, it’s tim to look at the rest of the league. The trade deadline this season brought several interesting moves that changed the landscape of this NBA season drastically. What happened to the whole “NBA GM’s are afraid to take any risks” label? It sure disappeared this season. But who won and who lost?

To try and put each teams’ moves in perspective, I looked at how the overall IPM’s of each team changed before and after each move. IPM (impacts per minute), in case you are not familiar, is my proprietary statistical player ranking method. It gives a good picture of how a player’s overall game influences his value on the court. The methodology is available here, player performance to date is available here, and team power rankings are available here. This information is always available through the links on the right side of this page, under the heading “IPM Data”.

To calculate the impact that trades had on a team, I averaged the IPM scores for each teams’ top 8 players both before and after the trade deadline. By calculating the percentage change in the data, one can surmise how a team’s prospects have changed. It’s not an absolute judgment, but a very good starting point.

On to the reviews:

The Losers:

Memphis: Pre-deadline IPM, 0.754; Post-deadline IPM, 0.678 (-10.1%).
Traded Pau Gasol and Stromile Swift for Kwame Brown, Javaris Crittenton, Assorted Beads and Trinkets, and Jason Collins.
While the Gasol trade was a total joke considering how little they got back, it was the right thing to do. They weren’t going anywhere with Gasol, so it was time to start over. Given the unstable situation this team is in, getting cap space and a bunch of draft picks is the best thing for them, since they weren’t in any position to try and win anything for years anyway.

Seattle: Pre-deadline IPM, 0.737; Post-deadline IPM, 0.711 (-3.6%).
Traded Wally Szczerbiak, Delonte West and Kurt Thomas for Francisco Elson, Brent Barry, Donyell Marshall, Adrian Griffin, and Ira Newble.
Impressive job by Sam Presti to manage to acquire only one player who would fit into their top 8 (Barry), and he was promptly waived. The interesting thing here is that Presti made deals that he didn’t have to (he doesn’t save significant money and will still have cap room coming) and he received players he didn’t need in order to help out San Antonio and Cleveland , the two NBA teams that have employed him in the past. Remember how Greg Popovich was whining that the league should have a “fairness committee” or something to strike down the Gasol trade? I don’t think he’s complaining any more.

Houston: Pre-deadline IPM, 0.842; Post-deadline IPM, 0.813 (-3.5%).
Traded Kirk Snyder, Mike James and Bonzi Wells for Bobby Jackson and Gerald Green.
I think the numbers lie here. Houston didn’t lose much. Credit Daryl Morey for taking the opportunity to rid his locker room of some headaches, even though the team has been playing exceptionally well. James and Wells were putting up decent per-minute numbers but weren’t playing all that much, and by adding Jackson they roll the dice on yet another backup point guard. Green is a good gamble, especially since he now gets to learn from the player he is most often compared to, Tracy McGrady (the jury is out on whether that turns out to be a good thing).

Phoenix: Pre-deadline IPM, 0.828; Post-deadline IPM, 0.807 (-2.5%).
Traded Shawn Marion and Marcus Banks for Shaquille O’Neal.
When I first heard of this move I thought it was a mistake for the Suns. Now I’ve seen them play with Shaq, and I’m convinced it was a colossal mistake. A team-killing mistake.
The trade doesn’t work on so many levels. I don’t understand the logic of wanting to improve their defense and rebounding and cut payroll, so their method of doing this was to trade their best defender and second best rebounder for a player who cannot defend or rebound any longer and is paid more and for longer. Meanwhile Shaq has not been able to stay healthy for more than 10 games at a time for years, and he now goes to a team whose coach has been derided for using too shallow a rotation for years? Incredibly, the Suns now only have nine players who average over seven minutes a game! I know Marcus Banks is terrible, but now they have to give his minutes to DJ Strawberry. Is that an improvement?
The whole “Marion is a superior player to O’Neal at this stage” argument aside, there’s another thing: for the Suns to make a deep playoff run they will have to play about 50 more games. In a conference that is so tightly bunched that a 5 game losing streak might knock you out of the playoffs altogether, what are the odds that Shaq will be able to stay healthy and contribute in most of those 50 games? 30%? 40%? To be charitable, 60%? Meanwhile, there’s a 95% chance Marion would be around for whatever the team needed from him.
I understand that Phoenix wasn’t happy with the team chemistry and blamed Marion (which is funny because the problem with Marion is that he blames everyone around him for all kinds of stuff , real and imaginary). But it would not surprise me at all if Phoenix misses the playoffs this season because of this trade.

Teams that Didn’t Change Much:

Chicago: Pre-deadline IPM, 0.765; Post-deadline IPM, 0.751 (-1.4%).
Traded Ben Wallace, Joe Smith and Adrian Griffin for Larry Hughes, Drew Gooden, Shannon Brown and Cedric Simmons.
Sort of like Memphis, the Bulls weren’t going anywhere this season, and long-term this was a good move. The Ben Wallace signing was not working out and by trading his cap-killer contract for Hughes’, at least the Bulls now free up court time for Joakim Noah and Tyrus Thomas.

New Jersey: Pre-deadline IPM, 0.796; Post-deadline IPM, 0.786 (-1.3%).
Traded Jason Kidd, Antoine Wright and Jason Collins for Keith Van Horn, Devin Harris, DeSagna Diop, and Stromile Swift.
Actually, New Jersey did a pretty good job considering they were trading a superstar. While Harris is no Kidd, he’s an up-and-coming player who recently signed a pretty reasonable contract extension. He’s certain to be better than Kidd two years from now. Diop was a nice acquisition, making up for the loss of Collins’ defense. I’m sure that they are pretty disappointed they didn’t move Vince Carter as well, but there has to be something to make their master plan of being under the cap in 2010 (for a run at LeBron James) more difficult.

Atlanta: Pre-deadline IPM, 0.759; Post-deadline IPM, 0.750 (-1.2%).
Traded Shelden Williams and Other Assorted Spare Parts for Mike Bibby.
Hey, look! Atlanta did something! And they got a point guard! This trade only shows up negative in the IPM because Bibby was coming back from thumb surgery a little slowly. This was an excellent move by Atlanta, as they got the player they needed, traded away four guys they didn’t, and dumped a huge draft bust in Williams. This trade should solidify their playoff position and an opportunity to get hammered by Boston in the first round.

Dallas: Pre-deadline IPM, 0.811; Post-deadline IPM, 0.817 (+0.8%).
Traded Keith Van Horn, Devin Harris and DeSagna Diop for Jason Kidd and Antoine Wright.
Between Jerry Stackhouse’s big mouth, Devean George’s obnoxious agent, an unnecessary $10 million in extra luxury tax payment, maybe Mark Cuban should have gotten the message: God thinks this is a bad trade for the Mavericks.
Enough has been written about “Jason Kidd is a great leader, general, blah blah blah” so that everyone forgets that he whined his way out of Dallas 10 years ago because he and Jim Jackson both wanted to date Toni Braxton. He’s fought with every coach he’s ever had and brought his personal problems to every team he’s been affiliated with.
I know that everyone loves playing with him, but Cuban just gave up a lot to acquire a guy who is 35 and was complaining about his contract before the trade. Also, Kidd’s shooting, never a strength, has slipped to 36% this season. He was still rebounding like a maniac (for a point guard), but it remains to be seen how that will hold up now that he’s on a team full of great rebounders.
I have one other question , who is supposed to guard Tony Parker, Steve Nash and Chris Paul? Kidd couldn’t keep Parker out of the lane in the finals four years ago!
Honestly, the more I think about this trade the more I think that Jason Kidd offers such a marginal improvement to Dallas that they gave up way too much to get him.

Miami: Pre-deadline IPM, 0.752; Post-deadline IPM, 0.765 (+1.7%).
Traded Shaquille O’Neal for Shawn Marion and Marcus Banks.
I thought this move would propel Miami firmly into mediocrity (which is a big improvement from “laughingstock”) but at 0-5 since the trade, that sure hasn’t happened. I’m glad that Miami did this trade because it will give an interesting look at whether Marion truly is a great, underrated player (as most stats analysts have said for years) or just a product of the Phoenix system who was made great by Steve Nash. When you look at the ratio of dollars per minute played, though, this was a great move by Miami, and probably their last chance to get rid of Shaquille O’Neal before he could barely play any longer.

The Winners:

San Antonio: Pre-deadline IPM, 0.828; Post-deadline IPM, 0.850 (+2.7%).
Traded Brent Barry and Francisco Elson for Kurt Thomas.
Got to love Phoenix’s roster management. They trade away Kurt Thomas to get his salary off their books, and then decide they need to make a panic trade because Thomas was the only player they had to match up with Tim Duncan. Meanwhile, the Spurs nab Thomas for themselves, and now they are the ones with a fresh body to throw at Shaq, Yao, Chandler, Bynum and Camby in the playoffs.
The rich get richer.

New Orleans: Pre-deadline IPM, 0.772; Post-deadline IPM, 0.794 (+2.8%).
Traded Bobby Jackson for Bonzi Wells and Mike James.
This was a funny trade for Houston and New Orleans. The Rockets , a division rival — gave the Hornets exactly what they needed (bench scoring from multiple positions) and took what the Hornets don’t need (a backup point guard) in return. You almost have to ask: What’s the catch?
Looks like Houston sure was desperate to rid themselves of those guys, but when a team has a great point guard like Chris Paul to boost everyone else’s stats, that sort of locker room whining probably disappears in a hurry.
With the West so bunched up and every team a 5-game losing streak away from falling out of the playoffs altogether, the Hornets needed to make a move like this to ensure they have enough firepower. The surprise team of the regular season might be ready for a deep playoff run now.

Los Angeles Lakers: Pre-deadline IPM, 0.818; Post-deadline IPM, 0.848 (+3.7%).
Traded Nobody They Wanted and Two Draft Picks That Will be in the Late 20′s for Pau Gasol.
What’s amazing is that Kwame Brown was only the 12th best player on the Lakers in the first place, and they turned him into a multiple-time all-star. What more can be said about this deal? Once Andrew Bynum returns then this team is immediately one of the top two or three in the West. The only thing that should be able to stop the Lakers from at least reaching the Conference Finals would be Kobe Bryant’s injured finger becoming worse.

Cleveland: Pre-deadline IPM, 0.755; Post-deadline IPM, 0.803 (+6.4%).
Traded Larry Hughes, Drew Gooden, Donyell Marshall, Ira Newble, Shannon Brown and Cedric Simmons for Ben Wallace, Joe Smith, Wally Sczcerbiak, and Delonte West.
How bad was the non-LeBron portion of the Cavs’ roster before the deadline? Every player they added became one of their top 8 by IPM, and one of those was Ben Wallace!
It’s really incredible how pathetic that team was before the break, and amazing that LeBron was able to carry them to the finals this season. Now, even with Boston and Detroit in the picture, they might be able to get back there this season.
Suddenly their roster has become deep and well-composed. Wallace still has value as a team defender, Smith is a nice all-around player who is a good complement for Varejao, and Delonte West suddenly becomes a valuable piece with the injury to Daniel Gibson.
But Sczcerbiak is the key here , he’s the shooter than the Cavaliers have been seeking for years, and while he can’t guard a chair, he is surrounded by A-level defenders in James, Varejao, Ilgauskas and Wallace.

Thanks to the trade deadline, the Eastern Conference has three powers now.

The Bucks-Hornets game on Wednesday was a very entertaining, generally well-played game by both teams. Lets be honest about this teams’ prospects — they aren’t going to the playoffs, so all there really is to root for are exciting, hard-fought games that go down to the wire. They took on one of the best teams in the league last night — an athletic team that matches up poorly against them — and made it interesting.

While the heat seems to fall on Michael Redd for not getting a better shot up with 5 seconds remaining, unfortunately it must be said that the real goat was Dan Gadzuric. His 8 shots were peppered with four missed layups and a blown dunk. Once again, I don’t understand why he is backing up Bogut. Wasn’t Voskuhl playing 20 mpg a few months ago? Without Villanueva available, Gadzuric should be playing his 10 minutes a game alongside Bogut so that he never gets any touches outside of offensive rebounds. I don’t really understand how Gadzuric can get the ball so much that he puts up 8 shots in 15 minutes (only one off an offensive rebound) while Bogut can only manage 8 shots in 33 minutes.

One logical explaination for using Gadzuric at center is that Krystkowiak wanted a better athlete matched up with Tyson Chandler, but Chandler was out of the game for 9 of Gadzuric’s 15 minutes.

But the bigger news is that the Bucks held a team meeting on Tuesday, and according to details posted on RealGM (and then on the Journal-Sentinel message boards), the results weren’t very pretty. The essence of the posts are that the Bucks aren’t very happy with Krystkowiak’s comments after the Knicks game, aren’t happy with Krystkowiak’s game management, and aren’t very happy with Mo Williams’ play or attitude.

First of all, with all due respect to the RealGm poster who goes by “Europa” and first developed this story, it’s important to take all of this with a grain of salt. It’s one thing to hear details about something from a reporter who has well-developed sources (and who should have confirmed his story with multiple people), and another thing from someone who puts something up on an anonymous message board. While the details that “Europa” posts may be accurate or true, there is no way to know. This meeting hasn’t been mentioned in any other media outlets — it may even have never happened. Since one would assume that a meeting like this would only be attended by players and coaches, then logically his source is a player, coach or one of thieir close confidants. This source may, for example, have some sort of a personal issue with Mo, and would try to portray him in a negative light.

But this meeting probaby did happen. What do I think of it? It’s great! I’m very glad to hear that the players understand that the teams’ performance has been awful and is mad about it. It seems like they realize that they have underachieved better than management does. And then they follow up this “horrible, divisive meeting” by losing by four to one of the best teams in the league? Wonderful! At least somebody seems to think that Krystkowiak’s coaching strategies are more suited to a college than a pro team. I’d much prefer that they get mad and start fighting versus simply becoming indifferent.

Look, no matter what walk of life you are in, whenever groups of people are involved in something that is going badly they start hating each other. Poorly-run businesses have politicking and back-stabbing all the time. Divorces happen in families that have had a run of bad luck. It’s normal. It’s part of life. And in professional sports (probably in basketball more than others, because the small roster size makes each individual more important) closed-door meetings and infighting happens with every single team when things aren’t going so great.

Portland’s turnaround has been credited to a single practice that had turned into a series of cheap-shots and fistfights. Just because a few insults are thrown doesn’t mean that teams are torn apart.

Thanks to my season ticket rep, my wife and I sat courtside in the corner by the Bucks bench for the Hornets game. I spent a lot of time watching the bench to see how much the team seemed to be in the game, and I was pleasantly surprised. Everyone (even Villanueva and Sessions, in street clothes) was paying attention for the whole game. After Gadzuric came out of the game in the first half (after missing four layups) several players came over to console him and tell him to keep his head up (leading me to crack the incredibly obvious joke, “I’m surprised he connected on that high-five”). I had a lousy view for the final play because the members of the bench kept on standing and walking onto the court to see it for themselves. It was clear that the team was working hard throughout the game at both ends of the court.

Even Mo’s much-maligned defense almost turned the game for the Bucks when he tied up Chris Paul at the end of the third quarter, leading a frustrated Paul to pump-fake throwing the ball at the official for not calling a foul (drawing a technical but probably deserving an ejection).

The Bucks didn’t lose on Wednesday because their effort was lacking, they lost because they played a better team that is exceptionally good at getting high-percentage shots. All the team meetings in the world won’t change that.

(This article refers to IPM, which is available here. IPM is described in the file, “What is IPM” and the article references “06-07 Team Predicted Wins”)

It’s time to start previewing the season! I’m going to cover one division every few days for the next month, and I’m starting with the toughest neighborhood in town (and home of the champs), the Southwest.

1: San Antonio: It’s becoming difficult to write about the Spurs , it seems like all they do every offseason is tinker a little with their bench, add 1 or 2 veterans who take less money than they could have gotten elsewhere, and add a European import that only they were smart enough to take a chance on. Well, that sums up this offseason as well.
They added Ime Udoka to spell and eventually replace the rapidly declining Bruce Bowen and traded Luis Scola for Vassilis Spanoulis, who was a highly effective guard in Greece before clashing badly with Jeff Van Gundy in Houston. The problem for the Spurs in this deal is that adding Scola to the Rockets makes them much better, but Spanoulis should fit in well as a backup to Tony Parker.

San Antonio may have only had the third best record in the league last year but they were the best team. According to my statistical measure, IPM, San Antonio underachieved by 3 games last year while both Phoenix and Dallas overachieved. (On a side note, I would guess that the Bucks were the only team to sweep the Spurs last year). It should be more of the same for San Antonio this year.

Typical boring old excellent Spurs. This is the best team and the best run organization in the NBA. The only thing they have to worry about is the age of their bench and the only thing they couldn’t withstand would be a serious injury to Tim Duncan. They return their top 9 players from last year (not counting Robert Horry, who returns but whose role has significantly diminished) and added a couple of potentially valuable parts. The Spurs should cruise to a 60 win season and I think they will win the championship again.

2: Dallas: The whole “Nowitzki shouldn’t have won the MVP because of his poor playoffs” argument drives me nuts. First of all, why does the perception of 6 poor games nullify the achievements of the previous 82? Secondly, Dirk wasn’t that bad , he averaged 20 ppg and 11.5 rpg in that series, and single-handedly won game 5 for the Mavs (down 9 with 3 minutes to go, a 3 possession stretch went Dirk 3-Dirk blocks a layup-Dirk 3-Dirk assist to Harris, and then Nowitzki made 4 free throws down the stretch to ice the game). The perception of Nowitzki having a bad series is masked by the fact that Avery Johnson’s coaching job was completely overmatched by Don Nelson. Nowitzki had 2 bad games in that series , game 1, when Nelson’s D was designed to keep the ball away from Dirk and Johnson never reacted, and game 6 when Dallas had no chance from the opening tip, losing by 25. Dirk was the MVP last year. Period.

The Nowitzki-blame game masked the real problem for Dallas last season , they weren’t nearly as good as their record. They overachieved by 10 games last season and, more importantly, seriously let up on defense at the end of the season. For the season I rank Dallas with the 10^th best offense and 2^nd best defense, but for the final couple of weeks of the season they fell off to the #26 offense and #7 defense. Part of this is normal energy conservation for a team heading into the playoffs, but the bottom line is that they weren’t playing hard (but still winning a bunch of close games) entering the playoffs and couldn’t get it going once they got there. That’s bad coaching.

What does it mean for this year? The Mavs did the right thing and didn’t shake things up, resigning Stackhouse and adding Eddie Jones and Trenton Hassell when Minnesota bought him out. They are expecting a breakout season from Devin Harris, indicated by the fact that they signed him to a contract extension despite their long commitment to Jason Terry. The team has a lot of dead weight on the payroll ($23 million to Michael Finley and Shawn Bradley this season) but a good rotation that has 10 solid, established veterans. Avery Johnson has gotten the Mavs to play serious defense for him, and that fact combined with the urge to remove the stain of last seasons’ playoffs should keep this team playing hard all season.

However, they won’t win 67 again , you can’t overachieve like that two years in a row, especially while playing a schedule that is heavy on games with San Antonio and Houston. I’ll guess 59 wins.

3: Houston: Many people seem to have the Rockets as the sexy pick to topple the Spurs this year, but I have my doubts. I thought they could make a run last season, but this roster has lots of problems , namely too many variables for a championship contender. Of course, starting with Yao and McGrady is a great start, two of the top ten players in the game when they are healthy. However, Yao has never made it through a whole season, and McGrady’s chronic back problems make him day-to-day every single night. Shane Battier has locked down the small forward position, playing his usual excellent defense but suffered through a fairly poor year offensively. But the other two positions are huge question marks.

The Rockets added Luis Scola, who has been one of the best players in Europe for several years and have turned over the starting power forward position to him. He projects to be a solid addition, but honestly, who knows? Can you really depend on any rookie to contribute? Point guard is an even bigger mess. They have clearly tired of Rafer Alston, and brought in a truckload of potential replacements. Steve Francis and Mike James , who have only found success chucking up gobs of shots for bad teams , and Bob Sura (???) are the leading candidates to replace Alston, as well as first round pick Aaron Brooks.

Just for the heck of it, the Rockets primary bench scorer Bonzi Wells also returns, and presumably he intends to play this season instead of just sitting around because he can’t get along with his coach. Oh, one other change; Jeff Van Gundy gave up on the team and they brought in Rick Adleman to replace him.

So Houston begins this season with championship aspirations but only two “sure things” among its top 8 players , Battier and backup power forward Chuck Hayes (well, 3 if you include Dikembe Mutombo elbowing someone in the face) , while the starting lineup contains questions about the health of its best players, the ability of its power forward, the identity of its point guard, and the motivation of its bench scorer. At least when they changed coaches they went to Adleman, who runs a system that is completely different than Van Gundy’s both offensively and defensively. They will be more entertaining than they were last year, but I don’t think they will be better. 48 wins.

4: New Orleans: After two years in the friendly confines of Oklahoma City, the Hornets lose their incredible home-court advantage and return to the Big Easy, which greeted the team with a collective yawn when they were there before Hurricane Katrina. I think this team might be in for a shock , they aren’t as good as they looked the last couple of years.

They quickly lost Peja Stojakovic last season, but that may not have actually hurt them all that much , his game has really slipped, and he is massively overpaid. He has back problems and has reached an age where injuries and declining athleticism take their toll. They signed Morris Peterson to play alongside Peja, but I wouldn’t be surprised if that becomes more a signing to replace him. The frontcourt is a strength, where David West has established himself as an underrated, solid player and Tyson Chandler busted out in a big way.

However, I think that Tyson Chandler’s breakout was more about Chris Paul than Chandler himself. Chandler has always been a spectacular rebounder (averaging between 13.5 and 14.5 per 40 minutes ever since be turned 21) and dunker but is so clumsy with his hands and footwork that he could never create enough to improve his offensive game. That all changed with Paul dishing to him. Suddenly Chandler was getting free for 3-4 alley-oops per game, and his shooting percentage skyrocketed to almost 63%. But it’s not like Chandler was doing anything different (besides staying on the floor more than he had with the Bulls), he just had a point guard that could see scoring opportunities better than anyone else could.

Chris Paul is one of the best players in the game , a case could be made that he is the best pure point guard in the league right now , but I don’t think his greatness is enough to improve this teams prospects much. The rest of the roster behind Paul, West and Chandler is pretty blah, and they have to deal with the double whammy of playing in a new city before uncertain fan support and having to play the toughest schedule in the NBA with a steady diet of San Antonio, Dallas and Houston coming to town. But Paul alone is enough to keep them competitive on most nights. 37 wins.

5: Memphis: Is Memphis much better than it was last year? They got outrebounded by 20 in a preseason game against a Spanish League team the other day. So I’m thinking they’ve got a ways to go.

The Grizzlies spent their cap room this summer obtaining two players who have never seen any success in the NBA , Darko Milicic and Juan Carlos Navarro. Navarro has been a solid guard in Europe for several years and, even more importantly, is very close friends with Pau Gasol. However, at 6’3″ Navarro is a tweener, and Memphis has a glut of point guards already. It appears that Darko’s chance at stardom was washed away while he was buried on the bench in Detroit, as questions about his motivation and attitude have crept up on him. He’s only 22 and you can’t teach 7’1″, so it must be worth the 3 yr/$20 million risk that he will figure it out eventually, right? Just ask the Lakers how that’s worked out for them with Kwame Brown.

The Grizzlies have been roundly praised for drafting Mike Conley Jr, but I have my doubts about this signing. Point guards , Chris Paul and Magic Johnson excepted , always struggle their rookie year, so it’s a little unfair to expect a 20 year old Conley to pay dividends for a while anyway. But Conley has to drastically improve his shooting to reach his potential and I’m not so sure he can “¦ because he shoots left handed but he is actually not left handed! It’s no big deal for athletes to use their non-dominant hand to gain an advantage , switch-hitters do it all the time, and Phil Mickelson is right handed but learned the golf swing by standing opposite his father and doing the mirror image of his swing , but Conley’s left handed shooting is terrible. He was a 30% 3-point shooter in college. So why make the game harder on himself by shooting with his off hand? Complicating matters is the presence of Kyle Lowry , he started his rookie season on a hot streak before getting hurt after 10 games so the Grizzlies owe it to themselves to try and see what they got in their 2006 first round pick.

The Grizzlies’ other big move this season was the signing of Marc Ivaroni as head coach. He’s got a lot of work to do to help this team move up in this division. I’d say their goal would be 33 wins , if they avoid a 50 loss season then it will have been a success.

A very quiet trade passed through last week: New Orleans traded Cedric Simmons to Cleveland for David Wesley and cash. Why is this deal of interest to Bucks fans? It closes the book on the Magloire-Mason trade, and the winner by a nose is Milwaukee.

Lets look back on that deal. The Bucks thought they were getting a solid player in Magloire, but were pretty much wrong. However the trade was necessary for them; Bogut was a rookie and the Bucks truly couldn’t assume they knew what he could deliver, so adding a center (for a player whose role would have been diminished with the addition of Bobby Simmons) made sense. Magloire pretty much sucked in every way but one — he could really rebound. The combination of him and Bogut at power forward (who is a good rebounder for a forward but only an okay one for a center) had Milwaukee actually leading the league in rebound margin for a while and helped propel them to the playoffs.

It can be argued that having Magloire around hurt Bogut’s development, but that can’t really be proven. It certainly didn’t keep Bogut off the floor, and his high-post role in the offense remained pretty much the same last year.

The Hornets thought they were getting a solid player in Mason who would help them sell tickets in their temporary Oklahoma City home. They were also wrong on both counts. If Bucks fans thought Magloire was bad in Milwaukee try Mason’s contribution — career lows in points, awful shooting percentages, more turnovers, playing his way out of the starting lineup by midseason …. and this was with Chris Paul passing to him! Meanwhile, the fan support was so good in Oklahoma City that they didn’t need the former Cowboy to help sell tickets.

Last season the Bucks flipped Magloire into Brian Skinner, Steve Blake, Ha Seung Jin, and later Earl Boykins. Mason had another lousy season and both teams underachieved badly.

But the real problem for Bucks fans was the fact that they included their 2006 first round pick in the deal, which turned into Cedric Simmons (that’s not to say that the Bucks wouldn’t have taken someone else, but I’m just talking about what has actually happened). Should Simmons have become a solid player then this trade would have been a big win for New Orleans, but Simmons was awful.

It’s not really that big a deal that a 21 year old rookie doesn’t play much and has a poor start to his career, but the two stats I like to use to judge young players who haven’t played much scream “bust” in Simmons’ case: rebound rate and free throw percentage. I feel that rebounders are born, not made, and if you shoot free throws well then you have the ability to improve on your shooting overall. Well, Simmons averaged 8 rebounds per 40 minutes (pretty blah) and shot 48% on free throws (yikes!). And now New Orleans has dumped him for a player who is going to retire.

The biggest thing here, though, is that Simmons only had one more guaranteed season on his contract — if the Hornets thought he had any potential then they could have just stashed him on the bench (or in the NBDL) to see what they have or if he could be a part of a better trade later on. But instead they literally dumped him for nothing! A team getting rid of a young player that fast says one thing to me … bad attitude. That’s not just accepting that he was a bad pick, that is separating him from your locker room (that’s just speculation on my part, by the way).

So the final score of the Mason-Magloire trade is:

Bucks – 1 playoff appearance, no players

Hornets – 0 playoff appearances, no players

Your winner: Milwaukee (but just barely)

UPDATE: I looked around on the internet for references to Cedric Simmons’ attitude and couldn’t find anything but positive stories. DraftExpress.com listed his attitude and work ethic as a strength, and other stories mentioned him being a no-nonsense guy. There must be some reason why the Hornets dumped him, but immediately thinking he was a head case may be a rather unpleasant leap on my part.